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By Brian Hews
E. Garcia (first name withheld) is a hard-working law-abiding Norwalk resident living the American dream with a wife and three children, residing in a modest house at the west end of this Los Angeles County city, a house he started renting 18 months ago.
“I love this area,” said Garcia, “the house, the neighbors, its all been great since we moved here.”
Garcia has never broken the law or been thrown in jail, and has one parking ticket from eight years ago. He is very active at his children’s school.
But his life was turned upside down last Thursday Nov. 6 when, for no apparent reason to Garcia, the Bellflower Sheriff’s raided his house at around 4 pm.
Garcia, who works weekends, was resting up for his delivery route, which starts early Friday and runs into Saturday and Sunday.
Garcia was taking a nap with his one-year-old daughter when the sheriff’s, acting under a search warrant, entered his house with guns and shotguns at the ready.
It was a scene out of a television cop show, Garcia, groggy and barely awake, sat up and watched in horror as seven sheriff’s came into his home dressed in full body armor yelling at him to “get down on the floor!”
Once on the ground, many of the sheriff’s pointed their guns at Garcia’s head, some with laser guided sighting, yelling, “don’t move!”
Garcia, “scared out of his wits,” followed directions but was vehemently complaining to the Sheriff’s as to why they were raiding his house.
They told him to “shut up, put your hands up, and come outside.”
A female Sheriff’s tried to settle his daughter down, who has a severe seizure disorder, and later brought her out to Garcia.
As they went outside and asked him to sit on the ground, Garcia kept complaining and asking the Sheriffs why they were raiding his house, Garcia all along telling them “I’ve never broken any laws, I’ve never done anything in my life against the law!”
Meanwhile other sheriff’s were ransacking Garcia’s home looking for “evidence.”
The Sheriff’s began explaining to Garcia that they were watching his house for the past two months.
They told Garcia “some very dangerous drug dealing men and women were using his mailing address, so we got a search warrant to raid your house.”
The sheriff’s called the two people they were looking for Jesse and Gloria.
Garcia, who now knew the Sheriff’s were wrong, then pleaded with them saying that it’s only him, his wife, two boys, and daughter that live at the house and have been for 18 months.
They continued to search the house then eventually left, saying nothing to Garcia.
Garcia told HMG-CN, “if they were watching the house for two months they would have seen that nobody except my family comes to this house.” He went on to ask, “if there was no evidence to suggest foul play occurring at my house, how did the Bellflower Sheriff’s obtain a search warrant when they have no evidence and nothing to go on, what judge gave them the warrant based on the information?”
HMG CM contacted a local criminal attorney who said, “This looks really bad. If nothing was occurring, as Mr. Garcia said, then what were the sheriff’s doing for the past two months and what evidence did they present to the judge to get the search warrant and who is the judge who issued the search warrant? Those are all questions I would have. ”
A disgusted Garcia told HMG-CN, “They were watching the house for two months, saw nothing, then decided to raid my house to see if they could find something? What evidence did they have, nothing that’s what, this was harassment and an unlawful search.”
Your articles are supposed to be news. They seem to be crossing the line to sensationalism. I appreciate your taking on your role as government watchdog and digging deep to keep us informed of the facts and the continued follow up like an old bull dog.
This story seemed to use a few too many adjectives painting a one sided picture without too many facts.
Keep up the good work, but don’t cross the line into sensationalism. We already have too many of those outlets!
I hope that the Garcia family impose a heavy penalty on the “storm troopers” who terrorized them. It’s not difficult to understand why these thug cops treat some people that way– racism!
This is seen in a more guarded way by the way the Republicans treat the President–because he is black. Who said that this is no longer a racist country?
Dr. Joseph Adan, Ph.D.
The Garcia family’s rights were abused by “Lawless” Law enforcement officers.
If they chose to seek damages, ask the judge to impose a sentence, in addition to other remedies, to publicly read the Constitution at the Garcia’s residence so that they learn to respect the rights of the very people they serve.
Dr. Joseph Adan, Ph.D., what in the hell does politics have to do with this incident in Bellflower?
And besides, the dislike for the president has absolutely nothing to do with race. It makes no difference if our president is white, brown, black, yellow, or purple. Our president is no leader and a leftist. And in his words, “Period.”
As for the incident in Bellflower, I would like to hear from the Sheriff’s Dept. The incident should be investigated and if Garica was wronged, then the Garcia family should be compensated, though not necessarily by money.
Under the premise of a search warrant, the deputies most likely proceeded properly. They needed to search the premises and secure the property first. That’s proper procedure.
What does “ransacked” mean. Does that mean the deputies searched all the rooms, the dresser drawers, etc., that’s also proper procedure. If, on the other hand, they pulled out all the drawers in the rooms and dumped everything on the floor, that’s totally improper. Without seeing the home and not knowing about the incident from the deputies’ viewpoint, I would suspect they thoroughly searched the home without “ransacking” the home.
So, I tend to agree with Brian especially in the use of “ransacking,” since it was not in quotes, i.e. Garcia’s words.
The deputies do not have to explain what’s going on during the time they secured and searched the home. Now, if the deputies did not explain afterwards, that is, at the very least, very poor judgement.
Overall, it appears from the limited information, the deputies proceeded properly. However, that does not answer the question raised in the headline, “Bellflower Sheriff’s Used Questionable Search Warrant to Raid and Search House.” Was the search warrant properly obtained and who signed it?
This is absolutely disgusting. This man’s home was violated and his family terrorized. If nothing is going on here and the “law” officers got the wrong home, which apparently is the case, the family should be compensated with a full apology, and yes, money, $10,000 as a small fee against the department. Perhaps they will be more careful in the future. This is going on too much in America. We have too many rogue ‘officers’. Almost every day there is a story about out of control officers harassing or attacking citizens instead of criminals. It’s totally out of control. Standards need to be raised to qualify as an officer, and some rules must be changed to protect law abiding citizens from presumptuous ‘law enforcement’ tactics.
This incident just shows who’s really in charge of the lives and property of the citizens of America. We think we have rights and protection under the law and the constitution, but how many times have we seen these rights trampled upon by some government agency. No matter what we say or do, any government agency can ignore our basic rights and listen to our phone conversations, monitor our internet use, search our car or enter our home without our permission, and even seize our wages or property with no recourse except long and expensive legal action. I know what you’re thinking. “If you have nothing to hide, you don’t have anything to worry about”. But what if one of those sheriff’s had thought Mr. Garcia was reaching for a gun and shot and killed him. Now he’s dead and there is no case against him because they didn’t find any criminal evidence in the house.
Dr. Adan,
The fact that you can jump to racism and generalize the actions of all republicans is just BIGOTED!
You also seem to jump to the conclusion of “storm troopers” for the Sheriff’s Deputies. Is this bigotry from all your years of spouting your undisputed BS in the public sector?